Repeat offender concepts aren’t new. However no concept has ever gained as much attention as the chronic offender concept whose definition was based upon the results of the Philadelphia birth cohort studies of Wolfgang, Figlio and Sellin. In our re-analyses, for the 1945 birth cohort, we were unable to find the severity escalation effect suggested by the chronic offender concept in the minds of career criminals. We did, however, find it for the 1958 cohort. Further analyses revealed that in both cohorts, over two thirds of all offenses and in particular of the majority of violent offenses were committed as first, second, third or fourth offense, thus before anyone could be labelled as a chronic offender, according to its definition. Therefore criminal justice policies based on the chronic offender concept are of little use and can lead to desastrous consequences.

In a spirit of peace and solidarity, beyond their guiding role toward intelligent ways of preventing, decreasing and punishing crime, criminologists must strive for education, research, and action - praxis - in the fields covering, more or less extensively, the entire social realm. The author reflects on humanism, on law enforcement, and on how criminologists are involved in the justice and prison systems as well as in education and research.

The aid center for victims of sexual abuse, funded in 1987 by members of the Chilean criminal police, illustrates how within a democratic system intent on protecting human rights, modem police mean to act by focusing on the victims. This new determination transpires in the reorganization of police recmiting and training in order to create a force geared to the interest and welfare of the community.

Québec’s corrections administrations are about to take measures counter to the main trends in north America. While elsewhere, even in Ontario, there is mainly talk of incarceration, retribution and longer prison sentences, Québec is going to close down prisons, cut down the prison population by 10 %, and stress alternative measures and communauty participation. In his analysis, the author confirms that reality matches theory while discovering a thought process essentially meant to adjust practices to financial resources.

In order to examine if today’s organized crime is a risk factor in the political order, both internally and internationally, the author first analizes the evolution and transformation of the organized crime phenomenon (terrorism, corruption, mafia); he then specifies the content of the «political order» concept (ideal, institutional, material); finally, he points to the possible connection between organized crime and political order (autonomy in relation to State political order, opposition to this order in its different meanings; last, conditioning of the material political order i.e. instrumentalisation of daily political life, local or natioal to aid organized crime). This last type of relationship has caused a strong reaction in the magistrature, with a wide support from the population.

In her account of the Aix-en-Provence symposium organized in June 1996 by the Institute of criminal sciences and criminology, the author first defines the notions of organized crime and order in society. Then, having divided order into economic, cultural, political, and social categories, she indicates what types of connections criminal networks can establish with these various orders; in the end, she shows how the awareness of the risks created by these types of interference has manifested itself through the States’ will to rally, will which could express itself to the detriment of national sovereignty.

The 51st international course of criminology held in Warsaw in September 1995, dealt with the impact of the political, economic and social changes on crime and its public image. The author analyzes the meeting’s contribution in four areas: 1. the evolution of crime in central and eastern Europe at a time of rapid systemic changes; 2. the dawning of new forms of delinquency during the transition from a socialist economy to a market economy; 3. the feeling of insecurity in post-communist societies; 4. terrorism in Europe. Some aspects of the course also dealt with possible solutions to these new problems.